SOUTH PORTLAND — Last month, Gov. LePage sided with the extremist gun lobby over public safety by signing into law L.D. 652, which allows violent criminals and domestic abusers and people with absolutely no gun safety training to carry hidden, loaded weapons in public places without a permit. Maine is now one of only a handful of states that do not require permits or firearms training to carry a concealed, loaded handgun in public.

As a gun owner, a hunter, the holder of a concealed-handgun permit and the father of a daughter who was killed by gun violence, I believe strongly in the right to have a firearm to protect yourself and your family. But I could not be more opposed to this misguided law.

about the author

Wayne Richardson of South Portland is co-founder, with his wife, Judi, of Remembering Darien, a nonprofit organization committed to helping victims of violent crime, especially gun violence.

My wife, Judi, and I never imagined we would become advocates for gun violence prevention. But when our daughter Darien was killed just over five years ago, we dedicated ourselves to trying to prevent other families from experiencing the pain and suffering we have felt, and continue to feel every day.

Darien was killed at the age of 25. She had her whole life ahead of her and so much potential. She had a smile that could light up a room and brought so much joy to those around her.

Darien’s mother and I will never get to see that smile again. Her homicide remains unsolved after 5½ years, in part because of lax gun laws that allow dangerous people to have easy access to firearms. That fact drives us to push for policies that keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people. And that’s why we are so deeply concerned about this new law.

Up until recently, Maine had a good law that required a clean criminal record and basic safety training for people who wanted to carry a concealed handgun.

That’s just common sense – after all, we require people to get a driver’s license and learn the rules of the road before letting them drive on public roads. Just like you need a get a license to drive a car, you should have to get a permit before carrying a loaded, concealed weapon in public.

And since current Maine law has a loophole that enables criminals to buy guns from unlicensed, “private” sellers – including strangers they meet online or at gun shows – without a criminal background check, the permit background check was often the only check a person had to pass before he could carry a loaded, concealed gun in public.

Let’s put this in perspective. In Maine, the gun lobby’s major argument for repealing the concealed-carry permit requirement is that you can’t throw a jacket over your gun without violating the law.

It’s been argued that Maine already allows open carry and that the simple action of placing your jacket over your holster means you were breaking the law. But unlike open carry, which people rarely do, concealed carry actually is common in Maine – and repealing the permit requirement means that untrained and dangerous people really will be carrying on our streets.

The public will have no idea what is being concealed under that jacket. In fact, a person can conceal multiple guns and a great deal of ammunition. This, combined with the fact that you can buy a gun in a private sale, including at a gun show, a yard sale or on the Internet, without a background check – it is frightening.

With mass shootings making headlines every week, and 88 Americans killed by gun violence every day, and hundreds more injured, now is not the time to weaken the few gun laws we have. I cannot comprehend why we would remove this important safeguard and make it legal for criminals and untrained people to carry concealed weapons in public places.

I know I’m not alone in this feeling. In fact, 89 percent of Mainers – including an overwhelming majority of gun owners and concealed-carry permit holders like me – did not want to see the permit system repealed.

Police chiefs from across Maine were also opposed to repeal, expressing concern about the public safety risks posed by allowing violent criminals, domestic abusers and people with absolutely no safety training carry hidden, loaded guns in public.

Not a day goes by where I don’t think of my daughter Darien. I am incredibly disappointed in our legislators and the governor for putting more lives at risk in our state just to appease the gun lobby.

Here at MaineToday Media we value our readers and are committed to growing our community by encouraging you to add to the discussion.

To ensure conscientious dialogue we have implemented a strict no-bullying policy. To participate, you must follow our Terms of Use. Click here to flag and report a comment that violates our terms of use.

diogenese2

There is nothing in the real life experience of the six states that already have Constitutional Carry that suggests that their citizens are less safe than the citizens of the other 44 states .

Joel Cook

quite the opposite…. safer!

athiest040

you should read the law and it’s amendments before spewing forth such a longwinded and inaccurate editorial,.. as a gun owner you should be ashamed of yourself for going off halfcocked and uninformed,.. the law signed has a requirement of a handgun safety course if one wants to carry concealed (same as the permit system) and by the way all gun sales at gun shows now require background checks (this rule was enforced by the organizers of the shows)

Dirty Lew

Is there anyway to enforce that?

athiest040

same way carrying concealed without a permit is,.. actually that is what the charge would be,.. criminals wont care

Dirty Lew

Well before, they could ask if you had a permit. If you didn’t you got charged. This was a good tool for busting criminals because they rarely actually had a permit. Bad guys caught with guns almost always got charged with concealed carrying without a permit, even if they had no prior convictions and were legally allowed to have the weapon.

Is there anyway to prove whether or not someone did in fact complete a handgun safety course?

EC

No sense arguing, Dirty Lew. A of folks feeler safer with a gun nearby, even though Maine has a very low crime rate and, most times, that gun — if used — would be used by a nephew or grandson on himself. But people can’t imagine that ever happening in their family. So, in the 1 in a zillion chance some home invader will barge in while they’re awake and ready, to swipe their $400 flat screen, they keep guns around.

xcalibur1066

This is wrong… there is not such training requirement in the final bill. There is only a duty for a gun dealer to present the buyer with a brochure outlining training options. The only other amendment is the Duty to Notify Law enforcement.

athiest040

i stand corrected,.. the ledgeslative website i was looking at was less than clear as to which amendments were adopted,..

xcalibur1066

It did change quickly and frequently.

DanH

19 states require no training to get a CCW license. I’d bet you cannot tell which ones by misuse or negligent use of firearms. To start with, AL, WA and PA have been issuing permits since the ’60s without training. Sorry about your daughter, I really am, but you cannot restrict constitutional rights without overwhelming data to support the restrictions.

EC

It’s also true that the states with the highest rates of gun ownership and the least regulations have more handgun deaths per capita than stats with lower handgun ownership and some regulation.
People love their guns, I get it. But more guns and fewer laws increases the danger. It really is that simple. A lot of it is suicide by handgun, but that is terribly tragic as well, as some of our family’s closest friends — who have had children shoot themselves in moments of despondence — will tell you. The parents and family members never get over it.

diogenese2

If suicide by handgun was the only possible way to commit suicide , it would still make the most sense to deal with the mental health issues rather than focus on gun control .

EC

As if we spend $0 on mental health services.

Joel Cook

No it is NOT “that simple” …. “But more guns and fewer laws increases the danger. It really is that simple. A lot of it is suicide by handgun…..” What laws would affect suicides as there is no “victim” if a person chooses to take their own life? and further, please explain Chicago, Washington D.C. , Detroit or states that have many more firearms laws (and fewer legal guns) which have higher crime rates than the safest places in the country like Maine and NH which have far fewer laws, far more firearms and still have less crime. We are talking CRIME not the Bloomberg/anti firearms scholars who use statistics and studies which include suicides, justified homicide by law enforcement and citizens and accidents as they are NOT CRIMEs.

Rich7553

False. The top ten Brady rated states have both a higher rate of homicide and violent crime involving firearms. Quit taking gun control group’s word for it and do the research yourself.

EC

The Fed government’s CDC, which is not a Brady group, has found what I cited: The higher the gun ownership rate, the higher the likelihood of death by handgun. Alaska, interestingly, was third — mostly suicides and with very high gun ownership. Two southern states were 1 and 2. Rhode Island, with the lowest rate of gun ownership, was last in death by handgun.
Makes sense, doesn’t it? States with more cars, more people and more traffic probably have higher rates of death by automobile, too.
Listen, if you feel safer with handguns around, I’m cool with that. Not going to change in our lifetimes anyway. Eventually, though, assault weapons and other semis like that could be restricted or outlawed. It will take like 4 school massacres in the same day or something, but that could happen.

JSH

First of all EC, you’re dead wrong about your stats. These studies have been twisted 80 different ways so that the data APPEARS to support your claim. What they don’t tell you is that they’re counting firearms deaths that shouldn’t be counted, deaths such as justifiable self-defense shootings. They count suicides, as you mentioned. Well, no one commits suicide because there was a gun around; they commit suicide because they are severely depressed, traumatized, scared, whatever; but the gun is only a tool that they use AFTER they make the decision to die. Restricting guns to prevent suicide is like banning cars to prevent DUIs. The car isn’t the problem, the alcohol is the problem. The gun isn’t the cause of the suicide, find the root cause and focus on that.

Here’s a little fact for you that you’ll NEVER get from one of your anti-gun sources. People with concealed carry permits commit fewer crimes every year in the U.S. than POLICE OFFICERS!!!! That’s right EC, we are the most law abiding, non-violent group of people in the world.

Finally, you can take your ban on semi-autos and assault rifles and you can stick it right up your flash suppressor. This is America and whether you like it or not we have the right to bear arms. That right is protected by the supreme law of this nation and there is nothing you can say or do that will change that. The 2nd Amendment has nothing to do with self-defense, hunting or sport shooting. The 2nd Amendment is about protecting the people’s right to remove the government from power and replace that government when and if it becomes too oppressive. Are you a football fan EC, well giving the government the power to regulate the types of firearms we can purchase is like letting your opponent tell you what plays you run. Does that really make sense to you?

Get this through your head EC, everything you think you know about gun violence and gun control, everything you believe to be true where guns are concerned, it’s all a massive heap of lies designed to convinced you that you need the government’s protection and that only the government can keep you safe. It’s all designed to sucker you into handing over your god given birth rights without ever questioning the reason or if it’s even what’s best for you. And you have fallen for it like the naive, brainwashed fool that they expected you to be. The fact is, if the government really wanted you to be kept safe they wouldn’t keep putting violent criminals back on the street after serving 20% of their sentence and then telling you that you should give up your right to be armed for your own protection. No, the government does not care about your safety. It only cares about it’s ability to control you and everyone else in the country with as little resistence as possible.

workingmansdem

Seems like permitting without training is more dangerous than training without permitting. Isn’t the training requirement in effect a permit? Is there some problem with this that I am missing?

athiest040

you cant be denied the training,.. you can be denied the permit without having broken any laws,.. simply by one officers opinion of your morals

JJJ

No wonder public discourse is at an all-time low; when people feel the need to blatantly lie in order to score political points it can only do harm. The bill clearly states on line 3 or 4,

“A handgun carried by a person who is not otherwise prohibited from carrying a firearm;” ie “violent criminals and domestic abusers” are not permitted to conceal carry. There are plenty of legitimate points that can be made in favor of the repeal of this law but blatantly lying to the public is disrespectful and most likely will cause people on the fence to side in favor of the law as written.

It’s sad that the left feels the only way to win votes in political debate is to consistently bend the truth and/or blatantly lie. Agree or disagree with with any law… that is your right as a citizen. But if you want to swing my opinion give me facts and not rhetoric and lies that are easily proven false with the littlest of effort.

xcalibur1066

The author has a lot of erroneous and misleading statements in his letter.

“which allows violent criminals and domestic abusers and people with absolutely no gun safety training to carry hidden, loaded weapons in public places without a permit.”

This law does not change what criminals have already been doing. People who got turned down for a CC permit still carried concealed. People who knew they would not pass the CC background check, simply carried anyway (see the road rage incident recently and the rash of armed robberies in Portland).

While his daughter’s death is tragic, it appears the main cause of her death was negligent medical care. Also, he implies that the person who broke in and shot his daughter had a concealed permit. However, we do not know one way or the other. Chances are the perpetrator did not bother with training classed and permits. Therefore, the new law would have any effect on future crimes similar to this.

“Up until recently, Maine had a good law that required a clean criminal record and basic safety training for people who wanted to carry a concealed handgun.”

Maine has had an open carry law for years. This is misleading. The restrictions on who can legally own/carry a gun in Maine are not effected by this law.

” including strangers they meet online”

Another misleading statement. If the buyer and seller are both in the state of Maine, an internet sale is conducted the same way a print ad sale is conducted. This law doesn’t change that. If the buyer is in Maine and the seller is in another state, an online sale has to go through a dealer with the required background check. Also, it is illegal for any person to knowingly sell a gun to a person they know is not lawfully able to possess a gun. Again, this law has no bearing on gun sales.

‘repealing the permit requirement means that untrained and dangerous people really will be carrying on our streets.”

The training is optional. In other states that have moved from required training to optional training, the number of people seeking safety training has actually increased. Why should Maine be any different?

“This, combined with the fact that you can buy a gun in a private sale, including at a gun show, a yard sale or on the Internet, without a background check – it is frightening.”

Again, Mr. Richardson is trying to promote Universal Background Checks implying the LD652 has changed the requirements for gun purchases.

“With mass shootings making headlines every week, and 88 Americans killed by gun violence every day, and hundreds more injured, now is not the time to weaken the few gun laws we have.”

Almost 100% of the perpetrators of the mass shooting had legally owned guns. Most of the cities with the most gun violence are also the cities with the strictest hand gun laws (see Chicago, DC, Detroit, Baltimore, Milwaukee). The Shandy Hook shooter had gun training. The investigators say this training may have made him more effective in carrying out his horrendous crime.

‘I know I’m not alone in this feeling. In fact, 89 percent of Mainers”

This poll has been debunk because of its slanted polling respondents. If this number were true why didn’t Every Town file for a voter referendum. Surely, with this number of Mainer’s opposed to the bill, collecting the required signatures would have been simple.

“Police chiefs from across Maine were also opposed to repeal, expressing concern about the public safety risks posed by allowing violent criminals,”

A violent criminal is not allowed to posses a firearm. What makes the author think a violent criminal would submit to safety training and permit? The Maine State Police supported this bill.

” after all, we require people to get a driver’s license and learn the rules of the road”

Read the headline in the PPH in the last 2 weeks to see how well automobile driver training and permitting protect other people from dangerous drivers.

“extremist gun lobby”

If the author is referring to the bogeyman “NRA”, the NRA had very little to do with the passage of this bill. The advocates of this bill were a grassroots combination of Maine citizens and legislators from both sides of the aisle. However, the out of state Every Town of Gun Safety spent huge amounts of money on a very intensive ad, robocall and e-mail campaign as well as lobbying legislators.

Bob P

Wayne, my sincere condolences to you and your family over your tragic loss. Your loss does not justify publishing false statements such as “sided with the extremist gun lobby” & “enables criminals to buy guns”. This type of rhetoric only clouds the issues.

Preserving 2nd amendment rights while at the same time assuring that law abiding concealed carriers are prepared for all aspects of this enormous responsibility is a difficult challenge that we all must focus on. As others have stated, laws don’t apply to criminals. Criminals are obviously unconcerned about the repercussions of illegally possessing & using a firearm. Focusing on the behavior of law abiding citizens will have no impact on them.

Pat Riot

“………which allows violent criminals and domestic abusers and people with
absolutely no gun safety training to carry hidden, loaded weapons in
public places without a permit.”
This opening statement is patently untrue. LD652 does NOT allow for anyone to carry a gun that is not LEGALLY allowed to own a gun. Violent criminals, domestic abusers, or any other ineligible person is NOT allowed to carry a firearm, either in a concealed fashion or openly. Your anti-gun rhetoric would be even more pointless than it is if you failed to include this often repeated lie in your op-ed.
“I know I’m not alone in this feeling. In fact, 89 percent of Mainers
– including an overwhelming majority of gun owners and concealed-carry
permit holders like me – did not want to see the permit system repealed.” Another falsehood. A very small survey, targeting urban residents, was conducted by a paid professional polling company who promise, on their own website, to “get the results that their clients want.” This ridiculous 89% figure (5% higher than the figure Bloomberg’s organization touted, by the way) does not even come close to reflecting the overwhelming pro-Second Amendment ideals of Maine citizens.

All this being said, I sympathize wholeheartedly with your situation and I sincerely hope that you and your wife can get some closure and healing soon. It is obvious that you have written this op-ed from an emotional standpoint and with anger and sadness in your heart and emotion often causes humans to err. What happened to your daughter, and your family, five and a half years ago does not, and can not reflect on LD 652. The “handful of states” as you put it, that enjoy the same freedoms that Maine now does, and their exemplary gun safety and gun crime records, do not bear out your gloom & doom dire predictions for Maine. Best wishes for you and your wife. My thoughts and condolences are with you.

TheCommonMan

Wayne, after reading this article I will be amazed if anything you write will ever again be published . Your obvious ignorance is laughable.

spideysplat

If it was not for the blatant disinformation it would have made for a better article, but when you throw out stats like 89% from a select survey from Cumberland county it shows desperation.
Also the training part gets me as well because open carry requires no training and has caused people who do not share the views of gun owners to harass them via calling the police every time the see an open carrier.

AKMaineIac

I’m sorry for his loss. Grief appears to have skeyed his view of things. People prohibited by law from having guns can not legally have, carry, guns.

Nobody has a “right” to drive a car. So dispense with that nonsense right away.

Criminals and lunatics don’t get permits, never have and never will.

Disarming sane, peaceful, law abiding people does not make them more safe. It’s like arguing in favor of breaking a deer’s leg so predators won’t chase them so far.

The PPH seems more like a leftist rag from the “occupied zone” down between Boston and Richmond than Maine.

There’s only one flaw in this author’s argument. The new law in Maine DOES NOT make it legal for violent criminals to carry a gun. The law simply states that anyone that can legally possess a handgun can also carry one concealed. Convicted felons cannot legally possess a handgun. So, even without that part of the law that specifies those that can LEGALLY possess a handgun, it is still illegal for a violent criminal to carry concealed; or even open for that matter.

Does this guy really believe that violent criminals that want to carry a gun are going to decide not to carry a gun just because the law says they can’t? Well, if so, then he has nothing to worry about since the law does specifically state that violent criminals are not part of the public that is allowed to carry.

Stop twisting the facts, stop ignoring the truth. Allowing law abiding citizens to carry concealed weapons has NEVER, NOT ONCE resulted in increased violent crime. Get over it.

VTXnME

Does anyone *ACTUALLY* believe that a criminal, planning to commit a crime, WILL NOT carry concealed simply because they don’t have a permit?? The only people impacted by any change in the concealed carry law will be the law abiding folks. Criminals aren’t exactly known for obeying rules.

Dirty Lew

“Do you think maybe Maine has a “very low crime rate” due to the prevalence of firearms and far fewer laws for firearms?”

No…. The low crime rate is due to low population density and rural nature of Maine. I don’t think it has anything to do with the prevalence of firearms.

Joel Cook

Well you would be wrong as many criminals KNOW there is a firearm in almost every house. The nature of a “rural” state is such that there are firearms readily available for protection and hunting. Thats why crime is concentrated in the cities where firearms are not as “popular”…

Dirty Lew

No… You’re definitely wrong.

Dirty Lew

None of those stats show that more guns reduces the crime rate. There are no “controls” to any of those statistics. Polling felons?….really? Plus they’re over 30 year old stats.

“Among advanced countries, the U.S. homicide rate stands out. “We seem to be an average country in terms of violence and aggression,” says Harvard’s Hemenway. “What we have is huge homicide rates compared to anybody else.”
Says Wintemute: “The difference is that in this country violence involves firearms and firearms change the outcome.””

If you were correct about “guns making us safer”, the United States would have one of the lowest crime rates among advanced countries, and that’s simply untrue.

Dirty Lew

More guns, less crime has been debunked.

“One of the major critiques of the study came from the National Research Council, which in 2004 extended the data through the year 2000 andultimately concluded that “with the current evidence it is not possible to determine that there is a causal link between the passage of right-to-carry laws and crime rates.” Or in other words, “More guns, less crime? ¯_(ツ)_/¯”
Now, Stanford law professor John Donohue and his colleagues have added another full decade to the analysis, extending it through 2010, and have concluded that the opposite of Lott and Mustard’s original conclusion is true: more guns equal more crime.”

And your FBI statistics show no correlation between the rate of firearm ownership and crime rates. The reduction of lead poisoning in children shows more correlation with the crime rate than firearm ownership.

Socio-economic status has way more to do with the crime rate than gun ownership.

James A.

Wayne Richardson is putting himself and family at risk if shtf

James A.

Any license is the governments way of stealing away your rights and selling them back to you.

Scott Knox

Many people will take safety classes as a result of the new law, but to assume most people are dangerous with a firearm in thier hands is ludicrous. Most Mainers grew up
with them and actually have some smarts and common sense. Yes there are some
certain people that shouldn’t carry,
my guess is that they wont without some training.